A couple of decades ago I wrote a column that at the time seemed reasonable. Today it sounds utterly insane.
Texas had an oddity on its ballots for generations – a “straight ticket” option. One vote, no thought. It was abolished in 2020 after a court battle where plaintiffs said “straight ticket” helped move voters along on a packed Election Day.
As an opinion editor at a Central Texas newspaper, I had interviewed the candidates for all statewide seats. At the time, the Texas Democratic Party was in such hopeless disrepair that some of the down-ballot Ds appeared to have no home address but the overpass.
Knowing what I knew, I wrote that Texas should make it so that anyone who voted “straight ticket” should be blasted with permanent green dye, much like a bank robber with boobie-trapped bootie. Easier, then, to ID the dumb.
Well, that has changed for me, and you can guess why.
I will vote for no “R.” I don’t care how sweetly reasonable he or she appears. Any candidate in the party of the Melon Felon is unfit. Period.
A lot of Republican candidates for Congress are acting sweetly reasonable right now, distancing themselves from the man who would rip democracy down to the studs.
Their supposed reasonability is immaterial. If their party retains the majority in Congress, we all lose.
I’m thinking right now of the voters of New Hampshire, one of those unpredictably “purple” states. The race for the U.S. Senate between Democrat Chis Pappas and Republican John Sununu is razor-tight.
I don’t care if Sununu is independent-minded and well-respected. If elected, he makes it more likely the next Senate will rubber-stamp this president’s court nominees and Cabinet incompetents.
I have trouble, based on national polls that show overwhelming disgust with the president, that anyone so disgusted would actually pull a lever to that man’s benefit. And it applies at every level. His taint is up and down the ballot. Anyone running in his party has pledged allegiance to him. Just observe what a Republican-controlled Congress has done, or not done.
At the GOP midterm fools parade in Dallas, the “YMCA” Waddler told fellow partisans to vote “Like I’m on the ballot.” I like that idea. What a losing formula. Let’s see:
Do you like reckless tariffs — taxes you pay every day with every purchase you make?
Do you support awarding America’s richest individuals with a tax bonanza they don’t need while yanking health coverage from people in desperate need?
Are you OK with the Justice Department prosecuting a president’s petty grudges?
At the same time, did you support blanket pardons for the Jan. 6 goons who battered Capitol cops and defaced the Capitol — your Capitol?
Do you support the latest forever war in Iran, hatched and launched without consulting you or Congress?
Do you think global warming is a hoax?
Are you inclined to “pshaw” this president’s mental instability and dwindling mental abilities? (Moments after a “Sleepy Joe” crack the other day, he was dozing.)
Do you want to parcel out public lands to insiders and exploiters?
Are you OK with stunting scientific advances in public health in favor of Google-ized theories and claims?
Do you support a chief executive who coddles pedophile pals and has spent most of this term blocking the Epstein Files?
The difference between the two political parties has never been more acute. Never. It’s time to choose between two coalitions, as is the case in Great Britain.
Don’t support Coalition Orange.
Don’t let any Republican put a smiley face on what he or she has done — by commission or omission — to enable and exalt a criminally corrupt man.
Maine’s Susan Collins is such a politician. A “moderate.”
Well, moderate Mainers, a vote for Susan Collins is a vote for you-know-who(’ll-screw you).
Spray me green. I’ll smile proudly. It’s a straight ticket for me, up and down.
For those on the fence, know this:
A vote for any R is a vote for Mr. T.
Longtime newspaperman John Young lives in Colorado. Email: jyoungcolumn@gmail.com.
